Debra Black
Staff Reporter
Despite Monday’s snowstorm, Toronto is
experiencing a snow drought while cities like
Washington, D.C. have been buried in snow,
says a Canadian climatologist.
Instead of watching the cherry blossoms
bloom in Washington, residents there and
elsewhere along the eastern seaboard have
seen unusually cold temperatures and
loads of snow. Some even suggest mega
snowstorms in places like Washington, D.C.
may be the beginning of a trend as climate
change takes hold.
This winter alone, Washington, D.C.
experienced two winter storms with twoto-three-foot snowfalls – something that
meteorologists suggest should only happen
once every 300 to 400 years.
Washington, D.C. has had 45 per cent
more snow than Ottawa, meteorologists
say. For its part, Ottawa, known as the snow
capital of the world, has had their smallest
amount of snow in 25 years.
Weather patterns across Canada – and the
GTA – over the past four years have also
been inconsistent, suggesting to climatologist
Dave Phillips that the weather and seasons are
becoming increasingly variable. In fact, after
two years of very heavy snowfalls, this winter
Toronto and the region are experiencing
what can only be described as a “snow
drought” Phillips said. But neither Phillips
nor Accuweather meteorologist Tom Kines
believe this is all due to climate change.
Rather they attribute it to El Niño – a
weather pattern that occurs when Pacific
waters off the northwest coast of South
America become unusually warm.
And this has meant a “snow drought”
for Toronto and the GTA. “This time last
year we had 145 centimetres of snow (at
Pearson airport)” said Phillips. “We’ve had
36 centimetres so far this year.” The total
amount of snow is down 40 per cent of what
we usually would get, Phillips said.
And even as the snow falls Monday, it will
only be a small blip with the GTA seeing only
as much as five to 10 centimetres of snow
and rain over the next 24 hours, Phillips said.
Phillips refers to it as a mere dusting.
In downtown Toronto there has only been
this winter 23 centimetres of snow, compared
to the average of 99 centimetres. Last year at
this time in downtown Toronto we had 128
centimetres of snow.
So that means no Snowpocalypse for us.
In fact, Phillips said none of today’s snow

After his
darkest night,
Giambrone
calls it quits
In making the decision of a lifetime, Adam
Giambrone lived through a long, dark night
of the soul.
It came overnight Tuesday and into
Wednesday after hours of grappling with his
management team about a mayoral campaign
in crisis. His most trusted advisers had
left his downtown condo at 8:30 Tuesday
evening not knowing if he would stay in the
race or quit.
Political strategists John Laschinger, Lecia
Stewart and Robin Sears had sat hunched
in his living room, talking about a rapidly
developing scandal over sex, missteps and
untruths until there was nothing to do except
leave him to make up his mind.
Giambrone, city councillor, Toronto Transit
Commission chair and the great hope of so
many experts who believed he’d be mayor,
told them it was over.
Nobody remembers his exact words. They
would all get written apologies anyway.
What they remember is the weight of it, the
emotion that seemed to suck the oxygen out
of the room.
GIAMBRONE Continued on A8

RCMP needs
broader
overhaul,
Tonda MacCharles
Ottawa Bureau

Enjoying a warm and sunny Sunday at the beach boardwalk.
will be on the by tomorrow when the system
will turn into rain and temperatures are
predicted to hover around 3-4C – downright
balmy for a winter’s day in Ontario. And the
weather will be the same for the rest of the
week – a mixed-bag with snow and rain and
by Saturday even warmer temperatures –
around 5C – arrive with sunshine.
“Is this nature on steroids, bad luck or a
trend?” Phillips asks, admitting he doesn’t
have a definitive answer. “The GTA has gone

from one of the snowiest winters last year to
wondering where is the snow?” he said.
“The seasons have become unpredictable,”
said Phillips. “Look at the summers the last
two years we had the wettest summers on
record. Then before that we had the driest.”
Is this part of a larger pattern? Neither
Phillips nor Kines believes it is.
“It’s a product of El Niño,” said Kines.
“It is not a product that we’re going to see
for the next eight years. This is something

Martin wins
8th straight
as men’s
curlers dump
U.S

special for this winter. You guys usually get
significant precipitation in the winter. You
get storms that develop in the south central
U.S. and head to the Great Lakes.
WHEATHER continued on A11
SNOW STORM comming to toronto A11

Life in
Haiti after
earthquake a
heavy cross to
bear

.

Bill Graveland
Sports

Andrew Chung
Staff Reporter

VANCOUVER— The “Michael Jordan of
curling” didn’t bring his A or even his B
game to the Olympics on Monday but Kevin
Martin’s Canadian rink was still good enough
to easily defeat the United States to run its
record to 8-0.
Canada gave up a rare steal in the first end
and finally took control in the fourth end but
at one point Martin was curling a paltry 38
per cent efficiency while third John Morris
was even worse off at 13 per cent.
“Ooh, lucky number 13,” chuckled
Morris after Canada rebounded to beat John
Shuster’s team 7-2.
“Yeah, a little sloppy. I don’t think it was
our best first five ends but when you have
round-robin first place wrapped up at this
stage, I think that’s sometimes expected.”

PORT-AU-PRINCE–Brightlywith coloured
slogans plastered on the rear windows of
vehicles are not uncommon in Haiti. The one
on Roland Noel’s rusting 1988 Isuzu Trooper
says Mi Ze’m Pou Ko’m, a Creole idiom
meaning “This cross is my own to bear.”
Never could the expression have more
meaning for him than now.
His SUV, once his taxi, is also his
home now, and seemingly his only refuge
in the world.
Noel, 58, throws his hands in the air to
imply “What can I do?” He is like hundreds
of thousands of others since a magnitude 7.0
earthquake hit Haiti on Jan. 12, killing 217,000.
Each displaced person, each family, is
finding a way to survive, to get by, and
eventually, to progress.

After the game, Shuster heaped maybe the
ultimate praise on Martin, anointing him “the
Michael Jordan of curling”.
Martin was also laughing at his team’s
first-half effort but admitted wrapping up
first place going into Thursday’s semifinals
took away from the team’s focus.
“We came out with a little bit of
complacency or a lack of focus after
yesterday’s big win,” said Martin. “But as
soon as they put a scare into us we all came

around really well and didn’t miss much in
the last five ends.
“It was good though to see the fire in
the guys and getting upset and that was
perfect. You can’t breeze through these
things easy and we did show a little
complacency this morning.”
Olympics Continued on E3

OTTAWA – The federal government should
boost RCMP ranks by 5,000-7,000, hire
more women and visible minority officers,
and impose stronger civilian oversight on the
Mounties, says a report by a group of Liberal
senators.
Although Parliament is prorogued, six
Liberal senators broke with custom, and
with their Conservative counterparts on the
Senate’s national security committee, and
released Monday a “position paper” based on
last year’s hearings into change at the RCMP.
RCMP Continued on E3

Roland Noel, left, makes a cellphone
call from his SUV
Noel is trying to get to Canada to be with
his wife. He doesn’t seem to be getting any
closer. His spouse, Marie Gerta Fanor, a
Haitian-Canadian woman who has lived in
Canada for 31 years, was on the Air Canada
flight that landed in Port-au-Prince the day
of the earthquake. The Star profiled her last
weekend, along with other passengers on
that flight.
Fanor was to have stayed with her
husband for six months, a joyous reprieve
in their long-distance marriage. Noel and
Fanor, a diabetic, decided she must return to
Canada. Back home, at her daughter’s house
in Chateauguay, Que., Fanor is beside herself
with worry. She calls him several times a day.
He does the same.
In the back seat hang a few shirts Noel
had at the cleaners. There’s also a flashlight,
umbrella and a small bottle of Haiti’s
Barbancourt rum.
Haiti Continued on F13

Tiger Apologises in a
press conference

CLAUDY, HIGH 1C
WEATHER MAS S16

Sports S1

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2010

Debra Black
Staff Reporter
Despite Monday’s snowstorm,
Toronto is experiencing a snow
drought while cities like Washington,
D.C. have been buried in snow, says
a Canadian climatologist.
Instead of watching the cherry
blossoms bloom in Washington,
residents there and elsewhere along
the eastern seaboard have seen
unusually cold temperatures and
loads of snow. Some even suggest
mega snowstorms in places like
Washington, D.C. may be the
beginning of a trend as climate
change takes hold.
This winter alone, Washington,
D.C. experienced two winter storms
with two-to-three-foot snowfalls
– something that meteorologists
suggest should only happen once
every 300 to 400 years.
Washington, D.C. has had 45
per cent more snow than Ottawa,
meteorologists say. For its part,
Ottawa, known as the snow capital
of the world, has had their smallest
amount of snow in 25 years.
Weather patterns across Canada
– and the GTA – over the past four
years have also been inconsistent,
suggesting to climatologist Dave
Phillips that the weather and seasons
are becoming increasingly variable.
In fact, after two years of very heavy
snowfalls, this winter Toronto and the
region are experiencing what can only
be described as a “snow drought”
Phillips said. But neither Phillips
nor Accuweather meteorologist
Tom Kines believe this is all due to
climate change.
Rather they attribute it to El Niño
– a weather pattern that occurs when
Pacific waters off the northwest
coast of South America become
unusually warm.
And this has meant a “snow
drought” for Toronto and the GTA.
“This time last year we had 145
centimetres of snow (at Pearson
airport)” said Phillips. “We’ve had
36 centimetres so far this year.” The
total amount of snow is down 40 per
cent of what we usually would get,
Phillips said.
And even as the snow falls
Monday, it will only be a small blip
with the GTA seeing only as much
as five to 10 centimetres of snow
and rain over the next 24 hours,
Phillips said. Phillips refers to it as
a mere dusting.
In downtown Toronto there has
only been this winter 23 centimetres
of snow, compared to the average of
99 centimetres. Last year at this time
in downtown Toronto we had 128
centimetres of snow.

Where is all the
snow?

.

After his
darkest
night,
Giambrone
calls it quits
Linda Diebel
National Affairs Writer

In making the decision of a lifetime,
Adam Giambrone lived through a
long, dark night of the soul.
It came overnight Tuesday and into
Wednesday after hours of grappling
with his management team about
a mayoral campaign in crisis. His
most trusted advisers had left his
downtown condo at 8:30 Tuesday
evening not knowing if he would
stay in the race or quit.
Political strategists John Laschinger,
Lecia Stewart and Robin Sears had
sat hunched in his living room,
talking about a rapidly developing
scandal over sex, missteps and
untruths until there was nothing to
do except leave him to make up his
mind.
GIAMBRONE Continued on A8

RCMP
needs
broader
overhaul,
Tonda MacCharles
Ottawa Bureau

Enjoying a warm and sunny Sunday at the beach boardwalk.
So that means no Snowpocalypse
for us. In fact, Phillips said none
of today’s snow will be on the by
tomorrow when the system will
turn into rain and temperatures are
predicted to hover around 3-4C
– downright balmy for a winter’s
day in Ontario. And the weather
will be the same for the rest of the
week – a mixed-bag with snow and
rain and by Saturday even warmer

Bill Graveland
Sports
VANCOUVER— The “Michael
Jordan of curling” didn’t bring his A
or even his B game to the Olympics
on Monday but Kevin Martin’s
Canadian rink was still good enough
to easily defeat the United States to
run its record to 8-0.

temperatures – around 5C – arrive
with sunshine.
“Is this nature on steroids,
bad luck or a trend?” Phillips
asks, admitting he doesn’t have a
definitive answer. “The GTA has
gone from one of the snowiest
winters last year to wondering where
is the snow?” he said.
“The seasons have become
unpredictable,” said Phillips. “Look
Canada gave up a rare steal in
the first end and finally took control
in the fourth end but at one point
Martin was curling a paltry 38 per
cent efficiency while third John
Morris was even worse off at 13 per
cent.
“Ooh, lucky number 13,”
chuckled Morris after Canada
rebounded to beat John Shuster’s
team 7-2.
“Yeah, a little sloppy. I don’t
think it was our best first five ends
but when you have round-robin
first place wrapped up at this stage,
I think that’s sometimes expected.”
After the game, Shuster heaped
maybe the ultimate praise on Martin,
anointing him “the Michael Jordan
of curling”.
Martin was also laughing at his
team’s first-half effort but admitted
wrapping up first place going into
Thursday’s semifinals took away
from the team’s focus.
“We came out with a little bit of
complacency or a lack of focus after
yesterday’s big win,” said Martin.
“But as soon as they put a scare into
us we all came around really well and
didn’t miss much in the last five ends.
Olympics Continued on E3

at the summers the last two years we
had the wettest summers on record.
Then before that we had the driest.”
Is this part of a larger pattern?
Neither Phillips nor Kines believes
it is.
“It’s a product of El Niño,” said
Kines. “It is not a product that
we’re going to see for the next eight
years. This is something special
for this winter. You guys usually

Life in
Haiti after
earthquake
a heavy
cross to
bear
Andrew Chung
Staff Reporter

PORT-AU-PRINCE–Brightlywith
coloured slogans plastered on the
rear windows of vehicles are not
uncommon in Haiti. The one on
Roland Noel’s rusting 1988 Isuzu
Trooper says Mi Ze’m Pou Ko’m, a
Creole idiom meaning “This cross is
my own to bear.”
Never could the expression have
more meaning for him than now.
His SUV, once his taxi, is also
his home now, and seemingly his
only refuge in the world.
Noel, 58, throws his hands in the air
to imply “What can I do?” He is like

get significant precipitation in the
winter. You get storms that develop
in the south central U.S. and head to
the Great Lakes.
WHEATHER continued on A11
SNOW STORM
toronto A11

comming

to

hundreds of thousands of others since
a magnitude 7.0 earthquake hit Haiti
on Jan. 12, killing 217,000.
Each displaced person, each
family, is finding a way to survive,
to get by, and eventually, to progress.
Noel is trying to get to Canada
to be with his wife. He doesn’t
seem to be getting any closer.
His spouse, Marie Gerta Fanor,
a Haitian-Canadian woman who
has lived in Canada for 31 years,
was on the Air Canada flight that
landed in Port-au-Prince the day of
the earthquake. The Star profiled
her last weekend, along with other
passengers on that flight.
Fanor was to have stayed with
her husband for six months, a joyous
reprieve in their long-distance
marriage. Noel and Fanor, a diabetic,
decided she must return to Canada.
Back home, at her daughter’s house

OTTAWA – The federal government
should boost RCMP ranks by 5,0007,000, hire more women and visible
minority officers, and impose
stronger civilian oversight on the
Mounties, says a report by a group of
Liberal senators.
Although Parliament is prorogued,
six Liberal senators broke with
custom, and with their Conservative
counterparts on the Senate’s national
security committee, and released
Monday a “position paper” based on
last year’s hearings into change at the
RCMP.
RCMP Continued on E3

in Chateauguay, Que., Fanor is
beside herself with worry. She calls
him several times a day. He does the
same.
In the back seat hang a few shirts
Noel had at the cleaners. There’s also
a flashlight, umbrella and a small
bottle of Haiti’s Barbancourt rum.
Haiti Continued on F13

A1

News

Students safe after Canadian boat capsizes
off Brazil
“Grieve, who lives in Cobourg, Ont. “There is no doubt the
crew was more than capable. The training is rigorous and
precise.”
Lesley Ciarula Taylor
Staff Reporter
All 64 students and crew aboard a sailing ship that operates as a floating classroom for a Nova
Scotia school are safe after a night in lifeboats off the coast of Brazil.
“Everybody is safe,” said a spokesman for the Brazilian Navy on Friday morning. Asked if
anyone was sick or injured, he said, “Everybody is fine.”
The S.V. Concordia, a three-masted sailing ship, sank to the bottom of the Atlantic in “hard
winds” and swelling waves, he said. “It has gone to the deep.”The 48 students, eight teachers and
eight crew were due in Rio de Janeiro Friday afternoon, he said.
They abandoned ship for lifeboats equipped with blankets and food at 5 p.m. Thursday, Rio
time (2 p.m. Toronto time). A Brazilian Navy helicopter spotted them three hours later and dropped
medical supplies. Three merchant ships answered the distress call and reached the lifeboats first.
Three lifeboats carrying about 48 people were rescued by the merchant ship Hokuetsu Delight,
said Capt. Cmdr. Maria Emila de Moura Estevao Padilha, communications director of the 1st
Naval District.
Naval planes and the tug Sea-Admiral Guillobel remained at the scene where the Concordia
sank after the rescue, Estevao Padilha said in a news release.

The life boats are sturdy and safe for the open seas, the spokesman said. The ship sank about
300 nautical miles off the coast of Brazil. The students were on a course taught by West Island
College International, based in Lunenburg, N.S., and had left Recife, Brazil, on the Concordia
Feb. 8. They were due in Montevideo, Uruguay, on Tuesday.
Canada’s Joint Rescue Coordination Centre helped with logistics after receiving the Concordia’s
distress beacon. Kate Knight, head of the school, said everyone was picked up between 4 a.m. and
6:30 a.m. Friday morning by Brazil’s Navy.
“They spent a significant amount of time” in the small craft, Knight told CP24. The life rafts are
equipped with blankets and food and are designed to keep people safe until a rescue, she said.
The sailors are aboard two Brazilian merchant marine ships en route to Rio, she said.
Maurice Tugwell, a retired Acadia University professor, is among the rescued, his family said
Friday morning.
“The Tugwell family were notified last night that the Concordia had sent out a distress signal
and we were later notified that everyone aboard the ship had been rescued off the coast of Brazil,
after spending several hours in life rafts,” Tugwell’s children posted on his voyage blog.
Knight “ensured everyone was kept up to date with as much information as was available.”
On his blog, Tugwell described an international crew led by Capt. Bill Curry, with an Australian
second mate, Polish engineers and an Alaskan ship’s doctor.
West Island College, founded in 1984, provides students from around the world with experience
sailing as well as classroom instruction. The ship was expected to dock in Montevideo, Uruguay,
on Tuesday. The voyage was to continue to South Africa.
The Concordia was designed and built for the school’s Class Afloat program in 1992. It is
classified as a 100A-1 Yacht, the website said. The crew consists of two officers, two engineers, a

bosun, a bosun’s mate, a cook, a cook’s mate
and a medical officer.
“Concordia is one of the most sturdy ships
on the water,” Pat Grieve, an alumnus of
the Class Afloat program of 2003-04 said in
an interview. “It has sailed Cape Horn, the
roughest seas in the world. It was not just
a ship. For 10 months and 32,000 nautical
miles, it was our home.
“The oceans can be very unforgiving,” said
Grieve, who lives in Cobourg, Ont. “There is
no doubt the crew was more than capable. The
training is rigorous and precise.”
Foreign Affairs Minister Lawrence Cannon
said of the incident, “All crew and passengers
have been recovered and are uninjured. This is
good news. I thank Brazilian authorities, who
led a search and rescue operation and acted
swiftly to assist the ship and its passengers.”
Foreign Affairs spokeswoman Simone
MacAndrew said Canadian diplomatic personnel
are working with the Brazilian government to
monitor and assist with the situation.

His parents, James and Anna, had nine
other children, all of whom predeceased
Babcock. Because his father died in a logging
accident when John was 6, he went to live with
relatives and didn’t receive much schooling.
The blue-eyed teen — who stood just
5’4’’ — signed up for the Canadian military
in Kingston. Though he tried to pass himself
off as 18, it wasn’t long before authorities
twigged to his real age, 16, and put him to
work unloading military trucks in Halifax.
Lying about his age again, he got on a troop
transport to England.

“I might have got killed,” he told an
interviewer matter-of-factly.
In 1921, he moved to the States and joined
the U.S. Army and fell in love with the West
Coast. After being stationed in Ft. Louis and
the Vancouver Barracks, he settled in Oakland
with his first wife, Elsie. The two were
married for 45 years and had two children,
Jack Jr. and Sandra.
In 1932, the family moved to Spokane,
where Babcock worked in the heating and
plumbing business. In the late 1970s, after
Elsie died, Babcock married Dorothy, a
nurse 29 years his junior. Between his two
children and her two sons, the couple had
16 grandchildren and a number of greatgrandchildren as well.
“We had a wonderful time together,” said
Dorothy on Thursday. “I’m so happy to have
taken care of him in his last years.”
“We
should
honour
(Babcock’s)
contribution to Canada,” said Rudyard
Griffith, executive director of the Dominion
Institute, an organization dedicated to
promoting Canadian history.
“The duty not to forget now falls on a
generation who has…been separated from the
history of the Great War by a period of going
on 90 years. I think there is a danger (that
people will forget).”
France and Germany both lost their last
WWI veterans in 2008, with the deaths of
Lazare Ponticelli, 110, and Erick Kastner, 107.
Now the duty of Canadians, say other vets,
is to never forget the sacrifice of Babcock
and those 650,000 other Canadian men and
women who donned their country’s uniform
for the Great War, as it was long known.
Remembrance now mostly lives on
through Remembrance Day, the Nov. 11
commemoration that recognizes those who
fought in all of Canada’s wars and conflicts.
But those veterans, too, are passing on.
“When all the vets are dead, it doesn’t
have the same meaning, because it’s an
extraordinarily personalized ceremony
of the generation who were scarred by
it,” says Patrick Brennan, a University of
Calgary historian who specializes in the
First World War.

Canada’s last World War I
vet, John Babcock, dies
Nicolas van Rijn
Staff Reporter
John Babcock, Canada’s last World War I
veteran, has died at the age of 109.
A 16-year-old when he went in search of
military glory, Babcock was the last of the
650,000 men and women Canada recruited to
serve in the “war to end all wars.”
Prime Minister Stephen Harper saluted
Babcock Thursday, paying tribute to
“Canada’s last living link to the Great War,
which in so many ways marked our coming of
age as a nation.”
The men and women who served, Harper
said, “paid dearly for the freedom that we and
our children enjoy every day.
“Today,” he observed, “they’re all gone.
Gov.-Gen. Michaëlle Jean, head of the
Canadian Forces, also paid tribute to Babcock.
“You know how dear the members of the
Canadian Forces and our veterans are to my
heart,” she said. “And while I am deeply
moved and saddened, I am also very honoured
to be the Commander-in-Chief and Governor
General to pay final tribute to Mr. Babcock.”
At one point Canada had mooted a state
funeral for Babcock, but he demurred, saying
that because he never saw active service —
because of his tender years he spent his war years
loading trucks in Halifax and digging ditches in
England — he wasn’t worthy of the honour.
Instead, Babcock — who died at home in
Spokane, Wash., on Thursday, where he had
lived for many years — will be cremated, and
his ashes scattered in the Pacific northwest
mountains, as happened when his first wife
died, years ago.
“I think his grandkids would probably want
to do that,” said his wife Dorothy.
“Jack loved the outdoors, he loved to hike.
Babcock, who was a few months shy of his
110th birthday, had been housebound since a
bout of pneumonia last October.
Recent visitors included the choirmaster
from his church, Messiah Lutheran, who
brought along a keyboard and a violinist for
an impromptu concert, since the Babcocks
had missed the concerts at Christmas.

Meme of the
week: Love on
the rocks, ain’t
no surprise
none of our customs was
more appealingly adorable
to idea-starved American
reporters than curling.
Tonda MacCharles
Ottawa Bureau
During an Olympic week in which the U.S.
press insisted on talking about Canadians
with the same paternalistic bemusement a

“You know how dear the
members of the Canadian
Forces and our veterans are
to my heart,” she said. “And
while I am deeply moved
and saddened, I am also
very honoured to be the
Commander-in-Chief and
Governor General to pay final
tribute to Mr. Babcock.”

Canada's last living World War I veteran, John Babcock
And although he left the country of his birth
to become an American citizen decades ago,
Babcock was recognized by both countries
when he died, after having his Canadian
citizenship reinstated in 2008.
“Jack loved Canada,” said Dorothy the day
that he died. “His heart was there.”
Babcock’s death leaves behind two other
known World War 1 vets: American Frank
Buckles and British national Claude Choules,
who lives in Australia.
Canadian zoo visitor would convey when
talking about an especially adorable monkey
– “look at all those funny little Canadians in
their funny little hats,” Canada-born Slate
writer Dahlia Lithwick sighed in summary –
none of our customs was more appealingly
adorable to idea-starved American reporters
than curling
As the blog Deadspin snarkily noted,
“every reporter ever” tried the sport in order
to write a first-person article that followed
the same utterly predictable arc as every
other first-person article: ignorant mockery of
curling to a newfound respect for curlers’ skill
to a newfound respect for curlers’ fitness to
general praise.
Tiresome – but at least most of the newly
positive reporter-curlers did a passable
job of explanation. On MarketWatch.com,
Washington-based blogger Bill Mann said
the following: “Curling is sometimes called
`shuffleboard on ice,’ but it’s more like the
Canadian equivalent of bowling.”

Buckles, 108, was just 16 when he lied
and signed up as an ambulance driver in the
U.K. and France. Following the Armistice, he
helped return prisoners of war to Germany.
Choules, 108, is believed to be the last
vet to have served in both World Wars. He
joined the navy at 14 and became a seaman
in the Royal Navy. He was 17 when he saw
action on the North Sea. He joined the Royal
Australian Navy in 1926 and was in service
for 30 years.

TRENTON, ONT.–Leadership at an air force
base rocked by scandal changed hands Friday
with the new commander urging the men and
women of CFB Trenton to break through the
dark cloud left by their former commander,
who is now facing murder charges.
A pair of signatures on a certificate
officially made Col. Dave Cochrane the leader

“When they asked me how old I was, I
said 18,” said Babcock in an interview a few
years ago. “Well ... you had to be 19 to go to
France.” While he was waiting for his pretend
19th birthday, official papers arrived that
listed his actual age, so he was sent to train
with 1,300 other underage soldiers.
By October 1918, having finally reached
the age of majority, Babcock was eagerly
awaiting deployment.
Instead, after he and a group of fellow
soldiers decided to defend Canadian honour
by taking on a group of British troops in a bar
brawl, Babcock spent 14 days of house arrest.
Unfortunately for Babcock, the Armistice
was signed during those two weeks, and he
never saw combat.
Decades later, he counted his blessings.
of the shaken base. But it will take more than
that to truly move past the allegations against
Col. Russell Williams, a top air force officer
said Friday.
“If (only) it was as easy as just signing a
piece of paper and telling somebody, ‘You
got the job’ and I’ll be satisfied that we have
a new wing commander and everything is
going to be fine,” Maj.-Gen. Yvan Blondin,
commander of 1 Canadian Air Division, said
at an assumption of command ceremony.
Cochrane assumed command of Canada’s
busiest air force base during the ceremony
attended by hundreds of officers and
dignitaries. With his family – wife Sherri and
children Jamie, 13 and Lindsay, 12, – looking
on, he urged the soldiers under his command
to stay proud.
“Stand tall, ladies and gentlemen. You
deserve it,” Cochrane said.
Williams, 46, is charged with two counts
of first-degree murder in the deaths of Cpl.
Marie-France Comeau and Jessica Lloyd.

Williams was formally relieved of his
command Thursday after making his first
court appearance, via video
.

Col. Dave Cochrane

Realtors step
up to aid Haiti
It’s estimated that the
earthquake in Haiti affected
as many as 3 million people,
taking the lives of 200,000
and injuring 250,000 more.

News

Pressure on Carroll to
run for mayor
been budget chief, a job that carries a lot of
credibility for voters.”
Wiseman said her challenge will be getting
the “seed money” for a campaign since two
other Liberals, former deputy premier George
Smitherman and former executive turned nonprofit boss Rocco Rossi, are in the race and
have been busy courting donors.
Carroll, a former school trustee elected
councillor in Don Valley East in 2003, said in
January she wouldn’t run for mayor because
she needed to focus on the budget. The $9.2
billion spending blueprint was unveiled
Tuesday and will go to a council vote,
probably in April.

Tom Lebour
More than 1 million people are now homeless
as a result of the disaster. It has been noted
that it was the worst earthquake in the region
in more than 200 years. Indeed, with respect
to loss of human life, it ranks in the top 10
most devastating earthquakes in recorded
history, dating nearly as far back as 500 BC.
Haiti is the poorest country in the Western
Hemisphere, ranking 149th of 182 countries on
theUnited Nations Human Development Index.
By comparison, Canada ranks in fourth spot,
preceded by Iceland, Australia and Norway.
Given that Greater Toronto Realtors
recognize the essential role that shelter plays in
everyone’s lives, the Toronto Real Estate Board
has donated $50,000 to the Canadian Red Cross
to help with relief efforts, and help the people
of Haiti. Realtors throughout Canada are also
offering help by making individual donations
through the Canadian Real Estate Association’s
Realtors Care Foundation.
TREB has a long history of donating at
home and abroad when disaster strikes. Last
year alone, Greater Toronto realtors presented
Realtors Care Foundation grants totalling
$171,000 to 20 local shelter-related charities,
including relief efforts to help victims of an
earthquake in China and those struck by a
cyclone in Burma in 2008.
We can take great pride in the fact that our
country has stepped forward to provide one of
the three largest military contingents to Haiti.
There is certainly more work to be done as much
infrastructure needs to be rebuilt.
For those of us fortunate to live in prosperous
nations, this devastation underscores the
importance of emergency preparedness on an
individual level. Even prior to the earthquake,
more than two million people in Haiti were
homeless, and shortages of potable water and
fuel were the norm.
It is my sincere hope that our donation will
help improve shelter conditions for the millions
of Haitians in dire need. Greater Toronto
Realtors are professionals who truly care about
making a positive difference in the lives of
those less fortunate around the world.
For more information on working with a
realtor, visit www.TorontoRealEstateBoard.
com. For more information on Canada’s relief
efforts, visit www.acdi-cida.gc.ca.
Tom Lebour is president of the
Toronto Real Estate Board, a professional
association that represents 29,000 realtors
in the GTA. The views expressed here are
those of the president.

An man is in custody following what is being
described as a deadly domestic in a Toronto
apartment on Friday afternoon.
Toronto Police were called to a Scarborough
highrise just after noon, where they found the
lifeless body of a 44-year-old woman.
Her identity and the identity of a man in his
late 60s who was taken out of the building in
handcuffs have yet to be released.
The woman was found shortly after 1 p.m.
on the 12th floor at 320 McCowan Rd., near
Eglinton Ave. E.; residents said they were
stunned by the news.
“This is pretty much a safe, family oriented
building with lots of nice people,” said
Jacqueline Menard. “It’s such a shocker. This
is such a quiet building.”
She said the man taken out of the building
looked “shocked” and “dishevelled” as he
was put into a police cruiser.
At one point, police had to steady him in
the elevator, she said.
“He looked really scared,” Menard said.
“At one point it looked like he was going to
fall but the officer said — ‘We got you’ — and
they steadied him.”
Police haven’t said what the relationship
was between the victim and the man in custody
or how the woman died in the 12th floor
apartment. A white car with a handicapped
sticker was towed from.

Shelley Carroll, husband Sandy in the background, takes a moment back in
December, when she signed papers to run again as a councillor and said she would
not be seeking the mayor's chair.

David Rider
Urban Affairs Bureau Chief
Councillor Shelley Carroll is strongly hinting
she has changed her mind and is poised to
make a run for mayor of Toronto, a veteran
political observer says.
Asked by reporters Thursday if Adam
Giambrone’s dramatic departure from the
race had made her reconsider her decision to

stay out of it, the city’s budget chief said: “It’s
only February. I’m not going to pretend that
the game hasn’t changed, but I’m still doing
the same thing I was doing before, making
sure that everybody understands this budget,
making sure it gets through council.”
Carroll is “opening the door” to a potential
run, said Nelson Wiseman, a political scientist
at the University of Toronto.
“She would be a very credible candidate
— a woman from North York who has

Observers say she can’t be
seen as politicizing the budget,
or using it as a springboard to
a mayoral campaign.
When Carroll said she wouldn’t run, two
other supporters of Mayor David Miller,
deputy mayor Joe Pantalone and Giambrone,
the youthful TTC chair, had already signalled
they would.
Most of the team behind the coalition
of NDPers, Liberals and some Tories who
supported Miller moved to Giambrone,
including John Laschinger, who worked on
the Miller campaign in 2003 and managed it
when Miller was re-elected in 2006.
In December, Laschinger, a veteran
political organizer, passed a hat among key
Miller backers, asking them to vote by secret

Mistrial declared in
dominatrix murder case

Sandra Rinella, left, is the former dominatrix mistress of Alexander Petraitis, right. They are charged with hiring Rinella’s former common-law
spouse to kill the woman who was Petraitis’s wife. Petraitis is the millionaire former chairman of magazine wholesaler Metro News.
Peter Small
Courts Bureau
A judge has declared a mistrial in a sensational
conspiracy-to-murder trial involving a multimillionaire and his former dominatrix mistress
after a key defence witness was found dead.
“A witness or a prospective witness in this
trial came to a sudden and unexpected death,
and that’s created certain legal hurdles,”
Ontario Superior Court Justice Robert Clark

Call to post
leaders’
expenses
comes back to
haunt Liberals
“We still don’t have
transparency in so
many pieces of what this
government does and we see
it day in and day out,”
Rob Ferguson
Park Bureau

Queen’s

told a jury Friday before releasing them. “The
trial cannot proceed at this time,” he said.
It is the third trial delay in a case that is
already six years old.
Alexander Petraitis, 67, former chairman of
magazine wholesaler Metro News, is charged
along with his former dominatrix mistress,
Sandra Rinella, 47, with hiring a hit man to kill
his then-wife of 40 years, Kirsten Petraitis.
But the so-called hit man, Kerry Robert
Anderson, Rinella’s former common-law

spouse, claimed to have never intended to kill
the millionaire’s wife. In 2004, he pleaded
guilty to attempted extortion against Petraitis
and was sentenced to 6 1/2 years.
During his guilty plea, he admitted to
threatening to tell the executive’s wife about
the alleged murder plot. He said he tried to
extort more than $1 million from Petraitis in
return for his silence.
On Tuesday, when the trial was about to
begin in front of the jury, Petraitis’ lawyers

A government attempt to embarrass
Ontario’s opposition parties into posting
their leaders’ expenses online, along with
cabinet ministers and senior bureaucrats,
appears to have backfired.
The New Democrats and Progressive
Conservatives quickly agreed to do so but
said the Liberals should do more to get their
own house in order given a spate of spending
scandals and a list of agencies such as hospitals
where public scrutiny remains restricted.
“We still don’t have transparency in so
many pieces of what this government does
and we see it day in and day out,” said NDP
Leader Andrea Horwath.
“Really, the government’s trying to deflect
their own dismal failure.”
Government Services Minister Harinder
Takhar issued the challenge in a two-page
letter Thursday morning just minutes before
the Legislature’s daily question period,
prompting the Conservative and NDP to
charge the Liberals were playing games.

“It’s politics,” said Conservative MPP
Peter Shurman (Thornhill), calling the
tactic “nonsense” from a government that
promised up to $15 million for the Grace
Health Centre on the eve of the Feb. 4 byelection in Toronto Centre.
Premier Dalton McGuinty pledged new
rules last Sept. 14 to boost accountability
and transparency in government after multimillion dollar spending scandals involving
untendered contracts and questionable
expenses at eHealth Ontario and the Ontario
Lottery and Gaming Corporation.
Under McGuinty’s new rules, which take
effect April 1, expense claims for all cabinet
ministers, MPPs who are parliamentary
assistants to ministers, senior management
in the Ontario civil service will be posted
online – as will the expense claims of senior
management in the 22 largest government
agencies, such as eHealth.
Shurman said any request for the opposition
parties to post their expenses should have

A2

ballot for the person they thought would be
the best candidate in 2010. The winner was
Giambrone, who later campaigned for 11 days
before a sex scandal forced him to withdraw.
Asked Friday if Carroll was considered a
strong candidate even though she hadn’t
indicated she would run, Laschinger said: “As
I recall, and that was way back in December,
she was everybody’s second choice.”
Laschinger said nobody has sounded him
out recently about working for Shelley, and he
wouldn’t answer the hypothetical question of
whether he would do so if asked.
Carroll has a plain-speaking, almost folksy
manner and can bandy numbers with any
member of the Bay Street crowd.
Friday, as economist Hugh Mackenzie
released a paper on the city finances at a CUPE
media event, she watched from the sidelines,
nodding and smiling, sometimes chiming in.
Looking through his paper, she leaned over to
an aide, pointed at a graph and said: “I love
that chart. That’s my favourite chart.”
But asked later about mayoral ambitions, she
cut the question short, saying: “Focus on Hugh.”
Observers say she can’t be seen as
politicizing the budget, or using it as a
springboard to a mayoral campaign.
John Cartwright, president of the Toronto
and York Region Labour Council, said that “if
Shelley Carroll were to throw her hat in the ring,
people would look at her very, very favourably.”
Pantalone has a strong record, particularly
on environmental matters, and his affiliation
with the NDP will draw labour support.

Edward Greenspan and Michael Lacy applied
to have it adjourned.
Outside University Ave.’s criminal
courthouse, Greenspan told reporters Friday
that the reason was that several days after they
had subpoenaed an important witness, he died
under suspicious circumstances.
“This is a rather bizarre turn of events,”
the courtroom veteran of 40 years said. “I
can never recall ever being involved in a
case where a subpoena is served on a witness
and they’re possibly murdered or potentially
a suicide.”
The police investigation into the man’s
death impacts on the trial and so it has been
adjourned to give police time to determine the
cause of death, he said.
Joseph Neuberger, Rinella’s lawyer, said the
witness was found burned in a vehicle in the
Eganville area, about 110 kilometres northwest
of Ottawa. Although police have ruled out foul
play, “there needs to be more investigation to
make that determination,” he said.
Eganville is where Petraitis now lives with
his new wife.
While neither lawyer named the deceased,
Ontario Provincial Police have confirmed that
the burned remains of Robert Verch, 41, were
found in a Toyota Highlander on a road in
North Algoma Wilberforce Township — not
far from Eganville — on Feb. 10. The vehicle
was completely destroyed by fire.
“At this time foul play is not suspected
and the investigation is ongoing,” Det.Insp. Guy Faucher told the Star Friday. He
said a coroner’s examination could take
several months.
He would not comment on the fact that
Verch was reported by the Eganville Leader
to have suffered burns and smoke inhalation
when his hunting camp took fire five days
before the fatal car fire and that he was treated
and released from hospital as a result.
Debbie Christinck, a reporter for the
Leader, said locals are puzzled by the death of
the father of five. “He was a real devoted dad.
He was the kind of dad who would rent out
our hockey arena to come with his family,”
come not at “the eleventh hour” but last fall
with McGuinty’s original announcement.
Takhar’s challenge came after the
opposition parties spent the last two days
since the Legislature returned from its
Christmas break hammering the government
over untendered contracts at regional health
agencies before the new policies against such
deals took effect.
Takhar’s letter noted that “online posting
of expense claim information enhances
transparency,
helps
maintain
public
confidence in public officials, and acts as a
deterrent to inappropriate expense claims.”
The NDP said the Liberals could boost
transparency by no longer interfering politically
with
freedom-of-information
requests,
as was charged in last summer’s Ontario
Lottery scandal leading to the firing of chief
executive Kelly McDougald, as well as giving
Ontario Ombudsman André Marin power to
investigate municipalities, universities, schools
and hospitals, and make hospitals subject to
freedom-of-information legislation.

S1

Sports

Canadian
Olympic
officials
lower medal
expectations
Jim Buyers

VANCOUVER—Canada is unlikely to pass
the Americans and finish on top of the medal
count at the 2010 Winter Olympics, officials
conceded Friday.
While they set the goal to “Own the
Podium” and come out on top in total medals
won at the Vancouver/Whistler Games, the
head of the Canadian Olympic Committee
noted the Americans are way out in front as
the Games near the halfway point.
“They have a ten medal lead on us,” said
Chris Rudge, the COC’s chief executive
officer. “They’re doing very, very well.
“It’s going to be tough.”
As of 5 p.m. Friday, the U.S. had 20
medals: six gold, six silver and eight bronze.
Canada was 11 back with seven medals: three
gold, three silver and one bronze. That was
good for a tie with France for fourth place,
one back of Norway’s eight medals and four
back of Germany’s 11.
Rudge told the Star he thinks Germany is
“a little bit behind” where the COC thought
they’d be at this stage, “but the Americans
are way ahead.”
The COC appears to be paving the way
for a reduction in expectations through the
Own the Podium program. But they also say
Canada should have a strong finishing kick,
with perhaps 9 to 11 medals in the next five
to six days.
Speed skating and short-track speed skating
look like especially good bets for medals.
“It’s a little too early to say we are far
behind,” said Rudge.
In 2002, Canada won 17 medals at the
Salt Lake City Games for fourth place in the
medal standings. In Turin four years ago,
the Canadians captured 24 medals and came
third in total medals won. The Americans
won 25 medals in Turin to finish second,
behind only Germany with 29.
COC officials have said they expect this
year’s total to be significantly higher than in
Turin, perhaps as high as 30.
The Vancouver Sun newspaper predicted
a stunning 39 medals, a prediction that has
virtually no chance of coming true.
Canada won just five medals in Calgary at
the 1988 Winter Games

This time last year, during a news conference
at a downtown bar held to honour O’Shea and
a pair of other Toronto Argonauts who were
ending their careers with the team, the allstar linebacker said: “Despite what all of you
might have thought, I am not retiring.”
Like the other honourees that day, safety
Chris Hardy and centre Chad Folk, O’Shea
didn’t play in 2009, although he never
formally announced his retirement.
But on Friday, the 39-year-old Milton
resident was named the Argonauts special teams
coordinator, one of eight assistant coaches
announced by new head coach Jim Barker.
“I don’t know that I have to retire to take
this job, do I?” said O’Shea, who played 16
seasons in the CFL, 12 with Toronto, where he
won three Grey Cups. “I’ll have to figure that
out. But you won’t see me in a jersey trying to
do anything fancy out there.”
All joking aside, O’Shea said that after
playing for so long for a proud franchise, it
“didn’t sit well with me” to finish his playing
career going 4-14 in 2008. The 3-15 record
of the Argos last season made him feel some
responsibility to help turn things around, he said.
“If I can be part of the staff that returns this
team to a championship, I’ll be very happy,”
said O’Shea, who for the past year was selling
orthopedic equipment to hospitals.
“I think there is a part of me that believes
I owe something to this franchise,” said the
linebacker and special teams standout who
made 1,151 defensive tackles, second all-time
in the CFL to 1,241 by Willie Pless.

Tiger Apologises in a
press conference

Tiger woods hugs his mother after talking on the presconference

Now, however, I must return to rehab seclusion and listen obediently to a whole bunch of other guys talking about all the nookie
they’ve had, which makes me kind of wistful and, well, horny.”
Doug Ferguson
Associated Press
PVANCOUVER-Why is this man telling me these things? We’ve barely ever even met. He shouldn’t
be speaking so to a stranger. And I don’t believe hardly a word of it either. My mother didn’t raise a
dope. Who’s he trying to dupe?
Like that part about not getting to play by different rules than other people. Of course he gets to
play by different rules. That’s one privilege enjoyed by famous people, sometime even when they
break the law, although this fellow committed no criminal offence. He may have trashed the vows
of marriage, as most people at least superficially accept them, but surely that’s a matter between
husband and wife, unless the betrayed spouse is demanding a public mea culpa.
He’s in the dog house where adulterous hounds often end up except, in his case, it’s a fancier
pad with a big tab daily room rate and custodians of the joint have pathologized the libido to the
extent of branding such behaviour an addiction, no doubt with a 12-step self-help program to
follow before graduating.
“Hello, my name is Tiger and I haven’t cheated on my wife in four months.” I was wrong, he
said. I was foolish, he said. I was caught, he didn’t say.
“I am deeply sorry for my irresponsible and selfish behaviour I engaged in.” To these ears, it
came out thusly: “I am deeply sorry for shagging a string of bar hostesses and porn starlets and
bimbos, most of whom – did you notice? – were big-haired blondes with cantilevered boobs and
not a one black like me, or even half-Asian like me. I’m really regretful that so many, at least the
dozen you’ve all heard about (wink, wink) weren’t able to keep their mouths shut after rubbing up
against my putter. And I’m sorry to the point of semi-disclosure that my activities have cost multimillions in endorsements lost, though I’m still the richest quasi-athlete (this is golf, after all) on
the planet, just don’t for a minute suggest I’m being vengeful by staging this non-press conference
on the very day of a tournament scheduled by my first-to-bail sponsor.
“This is merely a coincidence because, while I’ve been out of that ridiculous sex addiction
rehab hangout for a while, this was the only open space on my agenda to formally show my face
before a hand-selected group of my very bestest buddies on the sports media planet, and by the
way I would like to thank them for being so complicit in my phony image and never writing or
telecasting what they’ve known all along.

Meghan
Agosta the
new face of
Canadian
women’s
hockey
Paul Hunter

VANCOUVER–There are three roads into
the tiny hamlet of Ruthven in southwestern
Ontario. Whichever you take, you can’t
arrive without knowing you’re at the home of
hockey Olympian Meghan Agosta.
In less than a week, it will likely be time
to update the welcoming billboards. They’re
a little understated, the townsfolk noting that
their favourite daughter was a gold medal
winner at the Turin Games as part of the
women’s hockey team.
Not only may Agosta win another gold
on the ice here Thursday, in the process the
23-year-old will have established herself as one
of the top players in the game and, quite possibly, the new face of Canadian women’s hockey.

“Indeed, excuse me while I give some of them a hug, but first I have to kiss my mom, who
taught me everything I know about Buddhism, most of which, of course, I’ve forgotten or ignored
because following those articles of self-discipline – exercising restraint and stuff – is hard for a
famous person.
“See, trouble found me. Plus, if I were being honest, which I’m not, I’d remind everyone
again that filthy rich and phenomenally exceptional athletes occupy a special place in the moral
firmament – and the VIP lounges, where it’s pretty much anything goes. So what’s a handsome
and rich and secretly (if not so secretly) sexual adventurer supposed to do – say thanks, but no
thanks, I’m married with children and if The War Department (my wife Elin) learns about this,
maybe by checking my voice mail and BlackBerry, she might threaten divorce and get some bigbrain lawyer to draw up a new post-nup agreement.
“But don’t you people go blaming Elin for any of this. The woman is a saint and I am really,
really still in love with her and really, really sexually attracted to her, no matter what any of those
leg-overs might have told media slimeballs. She never hit me with a golf club that Thanksgiving
night before I totalled my Escalade. And I’ve never hit her either. ‘There has never been an
episode of domestic violence in our marriage, ever. Elin has shown enormous grace and poise
throughout this ordeal. Elin deserves praise, not blame.’
“The rest of you, however, and especially those aggressive paparazzi, should be disembowelled.
Shame on you for chasing my kids and my mom, even stalking my 2 1/2-year old daughter at her
nursery school. Can you see the smoke coming out of my ears? Hoo-boy, I’m angry. What do you
mean this was to be expected as a part of the fame package when my infidelity is Page One all over
the planet and I’ve gone into hiding. “Sorry, where was I? Oh yes, apologizing to my sponsors
and my employees and all the kids who looked up to me as a role model, which was how my dad
groomed me since I was 2 years old and swinging clubs with Bob Hope, who’s still dead. And
have I mentioned the scholarships that I fund, the one with my dad’s name on it because he was
my hero but he’s dead, too, and, see, I have issues. But I still am a nice guy under all those layers
of pretence. ‘Character and decency are what really count.’
“But let’s get down to the short strokes now. I will get out on the golf circuit again, maybe
later this year, at which juncture fans will start watching the sport again. I will save golf from,
uh, myself.
“Now, however, I must return to rehab seclusion and listen obediently to a whole bunch of other
guys talking about all the nookie they’ve had, which makes me kind of wistful and, well, horny.”

Three games into the tournament, with a
semifinal set for Monday against Finland,
Agosta already has eight goals and 12 points
to lead in both categories. She has tied the
record for goals in one Olympic tournament,
equalling fellow Canadian Danielle Goyette’s
high watermark in 1998.
It’s been a remarkable evolution, from
a chance to go to the Games at Turin, to
Canada’s go-to scorer at Vancouver.
“Last Olympics, she didn’t get a ton of ice
time. She was a young kid and it was her first

“Anyone who was breathing
wanted her,” says Mercyhurst
coach Mike Sisti, as he recalled
the recruiting process that
eventually brought Agosta to
his campus as a criminal
justice major.
time,” says veteran teammate Gillian Apps.
“Now she’s kind of exploded on to the world
stage. She’s a phenomenal hockey player.”
While she is becoming a bigger name
at this Olympics, Agosta’s talent — the
quick acceleration, the dead-eye accurate
shot — created a buzz before she began in
integrating into the national women’s team
in 2004. The female Sidney Crosby she was
sometimes called – even wearing the same
No. 87 sometimes to commemorate the
birth year she shares with the Kid — and the
scouts took notice.

Meghan Agosta one of the prime pieces of Canada’s offensive juggernaut.

Jon Montgomery proudly displays the Canadian flag after winning gold in the Olympic men’s skeleton competition.

Randy Starkman and
Kevin McGran

WHISTLER, B.C.—It took an athlete with
the Maple Leaf tattooed on his heart to seize a
gold medal in the mountains for Canada at the
2010 Winter Olympics.
Just two hours after gold-medal favourite
Mellisa Hollingworth suffered a crushing
fifth-place finish, Jon Montgomery of
Russell, Man., made like a red-headed rocket
to pull off a thrilling come from behind
victory in men’s skeleton Friday night at the
Whistler Sliding Centre.
A fast-talking auto auctioneer who counts
former hockey great Theo Fleury as his hero,
Montgomery delivered a clutch performance
to win Canada’s first medal in Whistler and
salvage what had been a disappointing day
for Canada up until then. The men’s alpine
team fell short of the medals in a super-G.
“I never lost my confidence,”
Montgomery said. “There were moments
where it looked like I wouldn’t win. But like
the turtle and hare, slow and steady I won the
race. Unbelievable. Couldn’t ask for a better
scenario. It hasn’t completely set in yet.”
Montgomery had trailed Martins Dukurs
of Latvia by 18/100ths of a second heading
into the final run and had been asked if he’d
be conservative to preserve the silver medal.
“No chance to win if I do so,” he said.
Montgomery was pretty much flawless in
that final run, putting himself in the centre
of the track and picking up speed all the way

down to finish with a four-run total of 3:29.73.
It was then up to Dukurs, the reigning
World Cup champion. He was in first most of
the way down, but then began to lose control
and time. As he got closer to the finish, it
looked like he might not hold the lead.
When Dukurs crossed the line in second,
the bearded Montgomery began to shout and
punch his fist several times into the air as
the crowd at the finish went wild. Cowbells
rang incessantly and Canadian flags waved
proudly as an impromptu rendition of O
Canada rang out among the fans.
“He deserves it,” said teammate Jeff Pain.
“He slid unbelievable. He was great. Trained
well, prepared well. To see anybody on the
podium wearing a maple leaf is a proud,
proud moment. I’m speechless. Jon and I
are fierce competitors, we push each other.
He’s younger and stronger and better. He’s a
great slider. He’s got a lot to learn and higher
places to reach.”
Montgomery got a Maple Leaf tattooed
on his chest when he was in Grade 11. His
mother took him to get it. He went back a
year later and got the word “Canada” tattooed
on top of it.
“Growing up, my father was a Canadian
history teacher,” Montgomery said. “He was
definitely a very patriotic Canadian and that
rubbed off on me. I was always a very proud
Canadian and wanted to emblazon it on my
chest to let everybody know that. And certainly
if I was ever found dead in a ditch, they’d know
which country to send me home to.”

Montgomery, the top hope for medal on
the men’s skeleton side, was not worried
about expectations entering the Games.
“It’s a matter of whether you want to look
at it as support or a pressure to perform,” he
said. “In my case, I don’t think you’d think
any less of me should I not get gold on the day
of the Games. I think most people will credit
you with having tried and representing your
country to the best of your ability, regardless
of the results. As opposed to people will hate
me and think I’m a moron and never talk to
me again if I don’t perform today.”
Mike Douglas of Toronto was seventh
heading into the third heat Friday, but
he never got to race. He was officially
disqualified because he failed to take the
covers off his runners in time. His sled was
supposed to be in Parc Ferme, the start area,
45 minutes before race time. Montgomery
was a world silver medallist two years ago
and won a World Cup on this Olympic track
last year, but this had been a spotty season
for him. There was a victory in Cesana, Italy,
but a lot of indifferent results as well.
Like his hockey hero Fleury, the
personable Montgomery hung tough.
“Theo was always a big inspiration
because of his stature, being so small and
having such great success in the NHL,
arguably one of the best players of his time.
He led you to believe if you want it bad
enough, you can get it.”

Young hockey players in Toronto are engaging in a uniquely dangerous pre-game workout:
Locker-room boxing.
Disturbing video recently shot inside the dressing room of 15-year-old Vaughan Panthers
reveals testosterone-fuelled teens hammering each other with punches to the head.
Despite an avowed crackdown on locker-room boxing by the Greater Toronto Hockey League
nearly three years ago, the practice continues as many parents call for a more vigorous response
from the league.
Wearing hockey gloves and helmets, several Panther players organized structured fights in
the centre of the dressing room as teammates – and coaches – watched the proceedings, some
capturing the moment on cellphone cameras.
In one skirmish that unfolds like a scene from the film Fight Club, a teen is clocked so hard to
the head he stumbles backward and braces himself against a wall to regain his balance.
Head bowed for several seconds, he appears shaken. Rather than any league-imposed
punishment against the players or the club, it was the coach of the team, Dave Castellani, who
imposed justice on himself and five players involved in the melees: A one-game suspension.
That’s not nearly sufficient, say some minor hockey parents who have watched the videos
They’re calling on the league to respond to such incidents – which some call widespread in hockey
locker rooms – with hefty suspensions and make disciplinary records of coaches public.
“These kids are being beaten and the coaches are standing there watching this,” says Liana
Seibezzi, who has a son on the team. “I’m sorry, but as a mother, I pay a lot of money and I expect
my kids to be protected in the change rooms. We pay thousands of dollars for this and they’re
supposed to be supervised.”
Seibezzi complained to the Greater Toronto Hockey League in a letter saying, “The head coach
of this team and an assistant coach were both seen on the video and chose to do nothing to stop
the locker boxing. Since these men are adults and team officials, it would have been expected for
them to take some action.”
A response letter from league executive director Scott Oakman says the incident was investigated
but, as a matter of policy, “we do not publicly disclose suspensions issued to team officials and
players. I can tell you all of those registered individuals involved were held accountable for the
indiscretions involved in this particular situation.”
Team coach Castellani and his assistant coach are both seen momentarily in the videos
Castellani calls the incident “a life lesson for me.”
“When I walked in the room I saw what they were doing, I said, `Guys, stop.’ They kind of
backed off.” He says he left the room to meet a parent outside, then started hearing more yelling
and screaming less than a minute later. So he sent in the team’s assistant coach to check on them.
“He looked and came out and said, ‘They’re still going at it.’ “
Castellani says he didn’t realize how serious the incident was until he saw the videos and did
online research on the phenomenon of locker-room boxing. “I wish we had been more educated
about this term `locker-room boxing’ because I would have been more forceful at the time than I
was. I thought they were just horsing around. ... I didn’t realize how serious it could have been.”
Asked about the length of his self-imposed suspension, Castellani said: “The GTHL felt the
actions I was taking and did take were a good approach as a punishment and, at the same time, an
educational tool. They were happy with that.”
Toros Assadourian, president of the Panthers, said the organization has communicated the
seriousness of the issue to its players.
“Thank God no one was hurt,” he said. “In our eyes, it was a road to injury and inappropriate
behaviour.” But the punishment doesn’t fit the offence, said Seibezzi’s husband Dave. “They say
it’s been taken care of, but how could it be taken care of if (the coach) is still behind the bench? I
don’t think one game is enough when you’re watching kids box with gloves on.”
Vito Valela, whose 15-year-old plays for a competing team, says teens across the city have been
watching the video.
“What bothers me is that the kids are impressed by it and it’s like it’s acceptable behaviour. My
son showed it to me and said, `Look at something cool.’ This is sanctioned violence. There’s no
guidance being given here.”
Fight nights in Canada’s minor hockey locker rooms aren’t new.
In 2007, league president John Gardner wrote a column for thestar.com about “locker boxing”
as “a new form of violence” that had found its way into amateur hockey.
“If it is proven that a coach knew (about) locker boxing and did nothing to put an end to it, that
individual would be best to submit his resignation before the League gets the information,” he wrote.
In an interview, Gardner said he was satisfied with the Panthers’ handling of the matter. “Every
situation has to be dealt with separately. I think the way it was handled and the message indicated
that this would never be tolerated again.”

Raptors come back to defeat
Wizards
Take a look at his (Bargnani’s)
blocked shots over the last
whatever number of games.
He’s got a consecutive streak
going now that ranks right up
with some of the best players
in the league right now
Doug Smith
Sports Reporter
For four minutes the switch turned on, the
intensity appeared, the game was won.
All it took was that span of exceptional
fourth quarter defence—when Andrea
Bargnani blocked shots like he thought he was
some imitation of Bill Russell and the other
Raptors hawked the ball like they seldom
do—for Toronto to subdue the Washington
Wizards 109-104 before a wildly enthusiastic
gathering of 19,149 at the Air Canada Centre.
All the good stuff they had been saving,
little tweaks to their defence they were
holding for the time would be in the balance,
paid off as the Raptors won for the second
straight without the presence of injured allstar Chris Bosh.
“We went small and every timeout we tried
to give them a different look,” said coach Jay
Triano. “We finally hit ‘em with a trap that
we had been sitting on; we finally hit them
with switches, which we had been sitting and
waiting on.

I think it was the last (5:40) they only
scored four points.”
In that time, the Raptors turned into
defensive demons and no one more so than
Bargnani, who finished with 18 points, six
rebounds and four blocked shots.
Providing excellent help defence in the
paint, he swatted away three Wizards attempts
during a 3:19 stretch late in the fourth when
Toronto went from down nine to up five.
“Andrea was huge, he had three blocked
shots in that time, he was there to help in
drives … we played with a lot of aggression,”
said Triano.
“Take a look at his (Bargnani’s) blocked
shots over the last whatever number of games.
He’s got a consecutive streak going now that
ranks right up with some of the best players in
the league right now.”
Bargnani has been credited with at least one
blocked shot in 13 of Toronto’s last 14 games
and four against the Wizards was one off his
season high. But the most important aspect of
the ones Saturday night were that they came
when the game was ultimately decided.
“You watch the games that we’ve played
well in this stretch and he’s always got his
hand on a couple of shots and he saves it for
the end,” said Triano.
“He’s very, very attentive to where the ball
is late in games.”
The Raptors were without an injured Bosh
for a second straight night and his absence
was sorely felt on the offensive end.
Without the anchor – and the guy they

could throw the ball to in late-clock situations
to get some kind of good shot – the Raptors
seemed disoriented at times.
But when Triano went to a small lineup
late in the game – Jarrett Jack, Jose Calderon,
Hedo Turkoglu, Antoine Wright and Bargnani
– they finally got some consistent offence.
“Without Chris, where you can give (the
ball) to him and you can make cuts off him
and you know that he’s going to create stuff,
we have to create without the basketball,” said
Triano. “We have to move and set screens and
roll hard to the basket.
“We were able to spread the floor when
we went small. Jarrett came in and was able
to turn the corner; Jose had been turning
the corner and hitting the jump shots on the
baseline, Turk was able to turn the corner
“(And) if you help off of Andrea, he’s
going to hurt you with the three.”
Jack was particularly effective in the fourth
quarter, scoring 11 of his team high 23 points
in the final 6 1-2 minutes, including six vital
free throws.
Turkoglu, who shed his mask early in the
game and found his rhythm when he did,
had 16 points, six rebounds and five assists,
including a huge offensive rebound, put-back
basket and subsequent free throw that put
Toronto ahead for good with just over three
minutes remaining.

Raptors’ Jarrett Jack goes to the net while being guarded by Washington Wizards’
Mike James during the first half at the Air Canada Centre.